In utility or industrial applications, medium voltage circuit breakers are employed to establish and break the electrical circuits. There are times when it is necessary to remove and insert these circuit breakers from or into the circuit breaker cell housing for repair or replacement or to control load requirements.
In the past, the circuit breakers were moved manually with the operator engaging an elongated shaft associated with the circuit breaker. Since the operator must be physically near the circuit breaker during the racking process, there is a possibility of injury or death should an electrical failure occur during the process. Furthermore, the circuit breaker or cell housing can be damaged during the manual racking process if a malfunction occurs.
Thus, there is a need to provide an apparatus and method for remotely moving a circuit breaker into or from a cell housing with operator at a safe distance from the circuit breaker and with the apparatus monitoring electrical current and position to detect equipment malfunction thereby protecting the equipment from sever damage and/or major failure.